It was soon time for me to make more "baby quilt and time out chairs" for new family members to be. My nieces were both expecting a second child. This time we were expecting a girl and a boy. So here are their sets.

I was teaching art in a middle school in Warrenton VA during my first few years as a quilter. So it probably makes sense that my art background and love of fibers always spurred me to want to experiment and try to discover the big "wonder what if we do this…? I began to experiment with Art Quilting, dyeing fabrics, painting fabrics…etc.I also went with a co-worker to John C. Campbell Craft schoolhttps://www.folkschool.orgcamp and took a class with http://www.bernierowell.comI enjoyed trying her techniques of painting with latex paints on fabric and canvas. I also took an Art Class from a local quilt store (now closed). I began dyeing some of my own fabrics. I continued having fun while learning to use my sewing machine.

So trying to remember the order I made my quilts during 2006-2007 is proving difficult. Sad I did not document my quilts better.

So let's see, my grandson Caleb came along in 2007 so I of course created my first grandchild a special quilt. His quilt was an A,B,C quilt, I figured mommy could use it as a learning aid lol also. His time out chair was a giraffe and a little different style chair then I had made in the past.

So my third quilt was actually the reason I decided to try quilting. My youngest child had been saving t-shirts from his sports and such for years in hopes that I would someday create a memory quilt for him using the various t-shirts.So I made the decision to just go for it, to make the t-shirt quilt I had been challenged to create.By now though I also was hooked on quilting, I wanted to learn as much as I could, I was no longer scared to death of my little sewing machine my mom had given me, in fact the hubby was encouraging me to purchase a new larger machine to accommodate my new found fiber medium.Again this quilt was long armed by someone other then me. Joyce a fellow guild member did a wonderful job of long arm quilting this quilt. The recipient and owner of quilt is my son Brian.

So after I created my "glow in the dark" turning twenty quilt I decided that I would take my hubby to our local quilt store at the time…and choose a coordinated set of fabric for my next real quilt. ;-) So my 2nd quilt was a lap quilt for my hubby. As you can see it is nicely coordinated but I learned quickly that I actually liked creating glow in the dark quilts more. At this time I was making my quilt tops only then sending them away to be long arm quilted.

Around the same time period that I was attempting to learn how to quilt I had two nieces that were expecting their first babies. So I thought to myself how difficult could it be to make baby quilts??? and at the same time there was a TV show that was popular think it was called "The Nanny"?? Well the show had made "Time Out" chairs popular so what better then to create baby quilts with a matching time out chair?My first two sets were given to Christy for Riley and Carrie for Mya.

I have been blogging at http://wannabequiltartisttjm.blogspot.com for quite a while YET while setting this site up it offered an onsite blog so I figured it might be a nice way to archive my quilts and some of my creative designs.So will start off by posting about my very first quilt. When I moved to VA, I joined a quilt guild as a way to try to meet new people. I choose to join a quilt guild because I had promised my youngest son long ago that I would someday learn to quilt so I could create him a t-shirt quilt. So my first quilt was a pattern called turning twenty. I was told to choose 20 fat quarters and show up for a workshop. I call this my glow in the dark quilt because I just choose 20 fabrics that attracted my interests and the quilt actually looked like it glowed…The recipients were my son JB and his now wife Claire. The year was 2006.